We NEED More Women in Sales

The nuance is that I'm not sure he got it because he was a dude. The nuance is that you didn't get it because of how people see women. And it's important to make that distinction because people start to get real defensive when you call out such a truth.

Welcome to another episode of the Revenue Reimagined Podcast. It is a special episode as you can see on your screen. We have three incredible co-hosts with us today to talk about something that is so important and arguably plaguing the sales and SaaS industry. We have Ashley and Katrina from Ashley and Katrina's Infinite Revenue Playlist, and one of our very first original and best performing guests of the show, Nikki Ivy's back with us again. Ladies, thank you. Oh, and the Dale guys here, ladies. Thanks for joining us.

Thanks for having us. Nikki was one of our first guests, too.

Yeah, Nikki. Is there like something out there on LinkedIn that's like, "If you need a first podcast guest, Nikki Ivy is the person to go after?"

Funny story. So I was on a Work Life Balance Podcast with a gentleman named Evan Patterson, and he said, "Nikki, you are the content waterfall." And I was like, "I'm framing that." Yes, you should. So I guess that answers your question. It's weird to say something like that about myself, but I guess we talked about this, Ashley and Katrina, on your show. I was selling them that I have a difficult time like accepting compliments or saying, "Yeah, this is what I do, and I do it well." When directly asked, I don't know why there is this like, you know, old evolutionary female urge, I guess, to be like, "Oh, I am legit, and everyone's going to hold me accountable."

I'm getting you a shirt that says "I am," and on the back it's going to say "The Content Waterfall." That shirt is coming. When I do a shirt order, I can't wait to find out what shirt I get.

What are you? That's going to be the gift we give to our guests. I am, and then everyone gets something custom on the back. I can make it happen. I have a client that's a printing company. I can make this happen.

As much as I'd love to chat about t-shirts and content waterfalls, we are here to talk about something much more important, right? So it is Women in Sales Month. It's the month of October. And there's not enough women in sales. Where do we start? Because that's a big one to start on, right? Like, we can probably go for an hour. We only have forty-five minutes or so. But let's dive right in, Dale. That means you have to be quiet.

I think one of the reasons that we connected is because I had noticed at SaaSter a huge difference between the makeup of the whole conference. It was very prominently white male. And that became really obvious when the bathroom lines were like insanely long for the men. Yes. And for the women, they were not. And there are a lot of things I experienced at SaaSter that just made kind of all of the things that I've been feeling a little bit more prominent in my mind. But that was the reason that Adam and I connected and talked about how this is legitimately a problem. And kudos to the two of you, Adam and Dale, for giving us this platform to talk about this. But it's a problem, and it's a problem because women are usually outperforming men in their roles. So it's not because we don't deserve to be at the table in tech. So that's where we're 100% like, you shouldn't. Like, there should be more people trying to help and elevate the women through.

I was in one of those lines at SaaSter, and when you posted that on LinkedIn, I was like, "That is so true." And I think as a male, you're standing in that line and you're like, "Okay, there's something not right." But like, you don't always make that connection. So like, when I saw your post, I was like, "Yes, this is definitely the problem. We need to try to fix this more than just have lip service to it." But how do we do that? Like, how do we get more women at the table to have these conversations to elevate them? That's the million-dollar question, isn't it?

And I think there's no one silver bullet to kind of address the situation. I think it's really up to everyone as an individual to understand and recognize that it is an issue. It's not just something that women love to complain about on LinkedIn to get content out of. I think the bathroom line, I think the reason why that was so significant, it was the first time I think a lot of men could really visualize, "Oh, there is a difference between the number of men and women in this industry."

And the reason why Ashley and I actually know each other is because of this entire situation. So we randomly got connected in an online community in a networking program. And one of the very first times that we got on a call together, Ashley, I'm putting you on the spot here and I'm so sorry, but Ashley completely broke down crying on the call because she was undergoing some very uncomfortable and unfair situations at work due to the fact that she was a woman. And even though she deserved a lot of things, she simply wasn't getting them. And she had no one to turn to on her team because she was one of very few women on the team. So she was crying to an absolute stranger saying, "Oh my God, like, is it me? Am I the problem?" Not to co-opt Taylor Swift, but you know, "What do I do about this?"

And we very quickly realized that we both had a lot of the same problems and no one to talk to. And that was kind of the birth of us starting our meetup series that meets monthly for women in revenue. And then it led to the podcast, which is really all about elevating the different voices of women in revenue. Because we want to be those people that are able to open the door for someone else and make this a better place for women to continue to join and work at.

Yeah. For me, it starts with, you know, we're saying there's not enough women. What is enough women? And how do we know when we've arrived, right? You know, if we're talking about numbers, McKinsey and all the other smart research people could probably quantify this, right? Probably say, "Here's what equity would look like in a given profession," right? If all things were equal.

But one of the ways that it became obvious to me when I first became a seller, that there weren't enough women, and what I think we can all take a look at, is when I was pointed in the direction of people to learn from—right? Who to follow on social, whose books to read, whose workshops to go to—they were all men. And this is, I started in SaaS in 2014, 2015, so they were all men. And the implicit message then is that this is where sales expertise comes from.

So enough women, right? For me, let's clarify. There's no such thing as enough women as far as I'm concerned, right? You can never have too many women in charge. That's what I celebrate.

But so this idea of learning from women and focusing on who we're treating as experts, whose efforts to dole out that expertise are supported—you know, in words and in deed, right—that is, I think, ground zero at least in the sales profession for how we start to really understand the scope of the problem.

Because now, if we step back and you start to think about, right, what are the—let's just say we're talking about sales podcasts—very few, very few of them are women hosting them. And you know, the expertise coming from that.

I actually experienced this back when I worked at Sweetfish Media. Shout out to James Carberry. Back when I worked at Sweetfish Media, who were doing sort of brand-focused podcast marketing before most people, one of the biggest challenges was finding women to interview on the podcast as experts. I don't know if you all run into that.

We struggle with it all the time.

And you said something that's so true. Like, words are cheap, right? At the end of the day, actions are all that matter. We could all say whatever all day long, but until you put the actions behind it, it doesn't matter.

One of the things when Dale and I were starting our show that we said we want to be very deliberate about is not being the male show. And even with—and again, actions are all that matters—with making a very conscious effort, it's hard. And I wish it wasn't. But it is.

And every company, whether you're a podcast or a company hiring or whatever, like, it's not just going to happen. Unless you put effort forth. Like, the women in sales isn't just going to show up and miraculously you're going to have a team that's fifty-eight and a half percent women. Like, you have to put effort in it from a sales leader to a podcast host to everything in between.

But stop saying you're going to do it. Stop putting this cheeky little DEI whatever on your website about how much we love diversity, equity, and inclusion. Yet when you look at the board, the board is seven white dudes that all look like me with bald heads. That's a problem. Shout out to the bald heads, my bad. But I love the way you're thinking about this. But I want to make sure when we talk about effort, like, yes, there are large-scale efforts that...

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Need to happen, but a lot of the time it ends up being a bit of a bigger problem than any one individual salesperson could solve alone. But if we're talking about what we as individuals can do, right, to Katrina's point, about how it's individual people looking at their behavior, thinking about the way that they think about stuff and changing it—it doesn't cost anything to follow people on LinkedIn, and yet most people have way more followers than people who they are following. I guess influence on Instagram told us it's a flex. I have no idea. But one of the things I did when I was thinking about this very issue—who am I learning from? Where is the expertise in my LinkedIn timeline coming from?—this was in May, right before Pride, and I was holding myself accountable. I was like, "Nikki, don't be the rainbow flag girl. Don't just be talking about the same five queer sellers that you know. Figure it out." So what I did was I went on to LinkedIn and I searched hashtags. I searched hashtags by topic and I just went through and saw who is posting, talking about these issues. Who are these voices? Because they're not just going to organically make it to my timeline, right? They're not.

So I would say as a first step, if we're talking about effort, it's a pretty low lift. Just search the hashtag sales. Find who the women are that are talking about the topic. And sure, you can be really discerning about how niche what they're talking about fits into what you're interested in. But I would say at this point there's so few voices that are able to actually emerge—of women in sales—there's no risk you run by following as many women who are out here trying to lend our voice and our expertise to this profession as possible.

Why are we not getting more women leading the education section?

You said something very interesting about the educational pieces. So like, when I think about people that are doing sales training, it is all male. Nothing. You know, John Barr's an amazing trainer. Dale's an amazing trainer. You know, all these people are really amazing trainers. But like, how do we find the women's voice to do these trainings? To build these companies?

I'm so glad—oh, sorry, sorry, go ahead, Ashley.

I was just going to say, as someone who has been trying to break into sales leadership as an individual contributor for an embarrassingly long amount of time, that door is very firmly closed. And it's really hard to speak from a place of authority if someone won't even give you the job title. So I'm getting emotional right now talking about this. I went for promotion nine times at my last company. That's why I left. I'm not trying to call anybody out, but I was given feedback that was not helpful. It was, "You're perfect for this job. You do a great job, but we just thought this other guy, this dude with way less experience, he's a better fit for us right now." And those are huge major problems. How am I supposed to go on LinkedIn and act like I'm a thought leader and be a sales trainer if someone won't even allow me to manage an SDR team? Like, that's hard to do. So I'm just telling you from experience: we have to open doors for women. And we can't expect them to know how to perform in interviews against men because the deck is stacked from the minute we walk into the room.

I just want to add that as the person that was on the receiving end of every single phone call from Ashley when she was going through this—she had all of the credentials. She was a top performer. She had years upon years upon years of experience. And still lost out on management roles to someone that was an SDR a year before. Like, make that make sense to me. As a third party when I look at that situation, the only thing that comes to mind is, "Oh, he literally got it because he's a dude." Like, I literally cannot think of another reason why Ashley would miss out on nine different promotion opportunities.

It's also nuanced. Go ahead, Ash.

I'm going to say it's not just because he was a dude. It's because they felt more comfortable coaching another dude to show up the right way in the interview because he was someone that they saw themselves in. And it's not necessarily like maybe he did perform better in that final interview than me and he gave a better presentation because someone at that organization took it upon themselves to tell them exactly what the cheat code was to do well at that interview. And that's what I mean by the deck is stacked before we even walk into the room. It's a problem.

Yeah, sorry, little stacked deck, just a little bit. But yeah, the nuance is that I'm not sure he got it because he was a dude. The nuance is that you didn't get it because of how people see women, and it's important to make that distinction because people start to get real defensive when you call out such a truth, right? Depending on how you say it, so if you say he got it because he's a man—like, "Wait a minute, I'm a man and no one ever gave me anything." Yeah, but you wouldn't know if someone ever didn't give someone else something because they weren't a dude. It's just not an experience that this person would have ever had. So when I think about it, why would they right away understand it?

The good news is, though—and I don't know that it's required that folks who are not even willing to make the concession that yes, this is a thing that women are up against—in my DEI work, I've kind of taken the mindset that I don't really need to bring those people along. I'm sorry. I would love to come on here and spout sunshine and rainbows about how if we can just reach these people and help them understand. Nah. Women have been excellent for a long time. We don't have anything else to prove. It's been proven. So anybody that's sitting over there waiting for us to earn our seat at the table—I mean, I got fold-in chairs for those folks.

I want to talk to every leader out there: the best leaders that I've had have been women. Like, the best leaders and managers that I've had, I've learned the most from the women's side of the conversation. They're more empathetic. They understand. They think deeply. I think the thinking deeply is super important. And they make you—it's not very reactionary. So I think we need, as a leadership world, we need to make sure that we're enabling the back-channeling because I think what ends up happening, Ashley, is like people get back-channeled all the time. And I don't think enough women have the right back channels. And I think the men that have these back channels need to open these doors for women to get the right back channels to have these conversations because I think that's the only way it starts opening up.

Like, if I knew the person that was at that location and I vouched for you, maybe you did some of this, I don't know. But I think that's what happens in a lot of these job interviews. Like, you'll have a conversation. Someone will back-channel. Like, I know when I always went for a position, I'd find all the people. I'd find out who's connected to who within that organization. And maybe what it is is like, how can we help people open up these back channels and have these conversations and start really promoting? "This is why Ashley deserves this position, and you'd be really dumb not to have her go through this process and give her that position." Because you're right, we need women leaders to be able to do training. Because, Nikki, after you said that, it sparked the light bulb to me. Like, we don't have a lot of women trainers in the sales world, and that could start flipping the dynamic.

Yeah, it's one of the reasons that Leslie Vets and I are doing the event that we're doing, and it's the reason why we've chosen #LearnFromWomen as part of what we're going to be doing to promote the event. You mentioned earlier—you mentioned John Barr. One of my favorite things, in my brief time that I got to work with those folks, is that they had a stable of fly-ass sales fillies. I mean, it was all women, right? And yeah, it's myself, Leslie Douglas, and others anyway. So there was this stable. It was all—I was shocked because I hadn't seen that, you know what I'm saying, in the training space like you're talking about. And this is no slouch. Like, these women are carrying a million-dollar quotas, right? Selling sales training, which you all know is a very crowded space, very crowded during the beginning of this little recession period that we were having. But that's what was going on there.

Oh, and by the way, they're training too, right? They're delivering this world-class training. Sometimes, you know, three, four sessions a day with different organizations. So the expertise is there. It exists. And some people are hip. Just Rachel May, like Rachel May is another one. Rachel saw her succeed there. So many incredible ones out there.

Go ahead.

Just because some of us haven't earned the title and haven't earned the right to share does not mean that we aren't perfectly capable of being fantastic sales trainers. It is very hard to motivate. This is like an intrinsic thing related to impostor syndrome because I could go. There's a lot.

Of a lot of knowledge I have, and I've done the job without the title a million times, and that is where it gets tricky because I feel like people are more likely to listen to somebody who is a dude than a woman if they haven't proven it and don't have the credentials behind their name.

Yeah, it's called "prove it again bias." That's what it's called.

And I know her well. Ashley, as you're talking, I'm just smiling, I'm upbeat, but I am seething beneath the surface. For what happened to you. And I, if you're healing, you're good, but like come on. I mean, we all—as a man, I'm seething. I mean, Ashley, you and I spoke when it was happening. Like this was even before Surfing Sales. And I remember sitting across—I think I was sitting across the pool from you—and I remember my blood boiling hearing the situation.

It's yeah, the problem is it's everywhere. This is common. Not just where you came from, not just where I've come from, not just where Dale works or where Nikki works. Like this is a pervasive problem that happens over and over and over again. And Dale, you said it. You know, you said your best leaders have been females. Like I tell the story on every podcast I guested on. I tell the story about the leader who fundamentally changed me as a human being and made me the leader I am. And guess what? Her name is Whitney. Like, how this isn't being dealt with and fixed in 2023, almost 2024, blows my mind.

I think part of the problem is—not to get all conspiracy theory on patriarchal things—but I think, you know, when I look at like the grand scheme of the problem, a system that's built to benefit a certain type of person, that person that goes through that system is not going to recognize that it's not made for someone else too. And if the majority of people in tech are men, they're going to go through life all happy, all Danny, saying, "Oh, things are great, right? Like if I work here for a few years I get a promotion, I can jump and get a VP title, whatever it is, right?" And like yes, they're not innately trying to fix the problem because it doesn't affect them directly on a daily basis versus now people are getting vocal and calling it out.

And I think to go back to our lovely friend Leslie, she talked a lot about being an ally versus an advocate. And then her definition being an ally saying like, "Yes, I support women. Of course they should get equal pay. Of course they should get equal opportunities." But Adam, as you said earlier, if you're just sitting there spewing pretty words and doing nothing about it, what good are you actually doing versus a true advocate? A true advocate is actually putting their money where their mouth is and actively seeking out women to hire, actively opening doors, and back-channeling them at their company so they also have all the right information to land that VP title, whatever it might be.

But of course the typical person—I wouldn't call you two the typical person, right? Because like you have a really big platform and you guys are awesome and you call out problems like this—but the typical man in tech is not thinking about these things. So they're not motivated to do anything to change it.

From my perspective, should I say they don't even know it's a thing sometimes? I'm telling you right now, on my exit interview with one of these leaders, I explained very specifically how I was feeling. And you know, I'm really excited to go somewhere where I can make an impact. And this person literally told me that he hoped I had more people like him in my life and instead of this other person at the org who was clearly the problem—even though this person was very much also part of the problem because he thought he was doing a good job in championing me. And he also said in the same breath, "You know, I'm glad you're moving on because I felt like maybe you didn't belong here."

What am I supposed to do with that? Of course, that would have been helpful to know during these interviews where I was being told, "Next time, next time you're up, next." If you really didn't even ever see me as the person for the role, you have to be honest with people. And in that case, maybe a little introspection over why you feel that way. Because he said he couldn't put his finger on it. It's because I'm an outspoken woman, that's why. That's what you can't put your finger on, sir.

Well, and I think like if you're honest with yourself as well, do you really want to work in an environment like that? Like that's not a place that I think you would thrive anyway. Like I think it's like we need to figure out ways that people can be in places that they're needed, executing, like really thriving. And if this is the environment that these people are creating inside of this organization, like I hate to say this, you're better off where you are now and being able to start with people that want to see you succeed. Because what happens is, okay, now you start, you're a leader in this organization, and if it's pervasive that this is the way people work, like you're going to get undercut. And then what does that do? Like as you become a leader, if people are starting to undercut you underneath, that will erode your confidence as well. So it I think it's hard when it happens initially, and trust me I feel really bad that these kinds of things are still happening. But would you really want to be there if that's the way they actually because it actually starts at the top? It's not like where that leader is, it's like up at the top. And if that person can't see it, it's very, very difficult to crack any of those in the organization.

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But Dale, the problem with that though is that it misses the systemic thing at play here, right? When we start to talk about it as if it's just this individual that needs to be educated, I think, you know, we have to be a little bit careful because if we follow that—I say this as a Black woman—but yes, right. So if I have to limit the places I can work, my job pool is limited to only those people who are comfortable working with the Black woman, and then of those people who are comfortable working with the Black woman, those who don't have preconceived notions that might make them believe I wasn't fit, you're narrowing my job pool.

Yeah, creating an inequity.

It amounts to economic exclusion.

Yep.

So what I don't want to see, Ashley, is, "Oh, you go to some place else, and hopefully there's some kind man to champion you, some benefactor." You know what I mean? This is not My Fair Lady. We good? But what so what needs to happen is that the actual issue is called out and unseated. And I think that when we start to talk about it as economic exclusion, then it makes perfect sense, right? You can think about it because the same people who do this, right, who do what happened to you, Ashley, they have moms, they have sisters, they have daughters, they have wives. And the way they think of them in the back of their mind, whether unconsciously or consciously, right, is different often from the way that they would think of a colleague or an equal. But they want their daughter, their wife to not be economically excluded.

It'd be too easy for them to say, "Well, if I want my daughter to be successful, I'll just teach her to be confident. I'll just make sure that she gets in the right rooms." There, did it fix it, right? No, no, no, no. What we're trying to prevent is not someone being mean to your daughter. What we're trying to prevent is not even just someone treating Ashley as unfairly as she was treated. We're trying to unseat the system. We're trying to call attention to what's actually happening, which is again that economic exclusion, and it multiplies itself.

LinkedIn did a study a while ago, you know, up to 78% or something of hiring comes from within people's networks.

Yep.

So like it is what it is. And I have a lot of rage about it, but it's not getting me anywhere, right?

Right.

So that's where I would begin framing this at. Say right, you are participating in the economic exclusion of women in this industry, in this profession. You want to be doing that or you don't? If you don't, I don't actually care that you change your ideology. I just need you to change your behavior, which is way easier. Feel how you feel about women. Feel how you feel about whether or not male privilege exists. But if I show you these numbers on paper and I can quantify for you the economic exclusion of women at your organization, like now you got to come to Jesus.

Also, saying that you didn't want to be there anyway kind of takes away from—like we have to think about our careers very strategically, especially in 2023. So I spent over two years at that organization, and now I'm starting completely from scratch. And whether or not leadership is on the table for—

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Me at my new organization is completely a guessing game. I can do the research and I can ask questions on the interview all day long, but that's the devil that I knew. So going and trying again and again and being told, "You know, not this time, but you looked really good. So like you're definitely going to get a seat at the table next time." Like that's arguably easier for me to justify staying there and working hard to try to get it the next time than going somewhere completely new and having no idea what I'm getting into. There's just a lot more to it than that.

And yeah, because then you'd be on the hook for all your short stints. That's more things for them to use as bias against me in the hiring process later. And if they did give me that title and I got it for six months and I hated my life, I would have that title and I'd be able to get another job. And I don't have that title in my background, so I can't get a job in that field or in that specific role that I'm perfectly qualified for unless somebody wants to be like, Nikki said, my benefactor. Or finding women that are leading in other organizations that have a path, which may or may not work as well, right? I mean, it's the same. It's the same challenge all the time. Like, I think we talked a little bit about this before as well. Sometimes women that become leaders actually block other women from being leaders because they felt like they've gone through that. So I'd like to open that up a little bit.

Ashley, I totally hear what you're saying, and I like the—I don't think leaving would necessarily be the right thing. I think you're right. You could potentially get the next opening in the job. I just wonder, like systemically, back to what Nikki's saying, at the leadership level there's something systemically wrong if they go through the whole process. On paper, you are better—even the same—the same are better, and then they pass you up on the job. I wonder like systemically, at the top of the company, there's a problem. That's a problem way above the person. Because they're not enabling or pushing down that this is something that should be happening.

Yeah, I understand the challenge. It's not an easy resolution to it. I do think if at any point in time I could help you get in any place and I know somebody at some place is looking for a leader, I would be happy to put you up there, because that's what needs to happen. We have to shine lights on people and show them that when they execute, when they do the work that they're doing and they're successful, that's what companies should want to have happen.

But the hack though, if anybody is curious about your particular situation, Ashley—what the numbers will tell you is that about five years ago or so, when Black people got fed up with dealing with this particular issue right—being passed over, being equal or better on paper and then being left as you were with really no other reason that you can come up with—other than that you didn't fit some organizational culture—Black women in particular left the workforce for entrepreneurship. Should we have had to do that? No. Is it still part of that economic exclusion piece? Yes. But when I hear you talking right now, Ashley, about who is in power to stow upon you some title of leadership, I hope you know that you're a leader already. Fact. Having this conversation, people will hear this and many women—when I got told no when I was trying to book people on BDB Growth by Women, they were afraid to come on the show and say something that their boss or somebody that they wanted to work with in the future might interpret as them being a troublemaker.

So like you doing it, yes. I look at women like, what's this young lady's name, Melissa Gagnon? I think she's awesome. Awesome. She's an AE. I never heard of this young woman until I saw her videos in my feed. I challenge anybody to tell that young woman she is not a leader, that she is not a trainer, that she is not an expert. She's doing it out there.

Ashley, do that. It doesn't have to be videos on LinkedIn if that's not your bag. Maybe you make, you know, PDFs, downloads, and hand them out for free. I saw that really succeed for Gabrielle Blackwell. But yeah, you're already a leader. Those who don't want to elevate you to the position, they're just not paying close enough attention. I don't know what else to tell you. You're missing out.

You have your own podcast. Like, you're doing your own podcast. Like you're speaking out. You are taking a leadership role. It's going to happen. You're not going to have it if someone's giving it down to you from the top. You're doing it yourself.

I didn't know this was going to be therapy for me, but thank you all for this. We love you. This is wonderful.

I was gonna say, part of why we started the podcast, Ashley, if you don't mind me sharing, is you wanted an external thing to point to to say, "Look, I'm interviewing all these very prominent sales leaders, entrepreneurs, BDRs, AEs. And that I can hold my own with them and give them information and talk about every aspect of sales and the sales cycle on my own show." And that even wasn't enough, which is wild. It's crazy.

I mean, that's the thing about women. We can't afford to take no for an answer. So I'm just really grateful that Katrina has been my partner in crime with a lot of things. And we are exploring the idea of entrepreneurship. Spoiler alert.

Tell me more.

I don't know. We can save that for another episode at a later time.

Yes, I do. I want to call out Katrina though, because I think you touched on this a minute ago, Dale, when you were talking about women on women crime. And I think it's definitely a thing, but I think women who are supporting each other is becoming a little bit more common. And it has been instrumental in my personal and professional growth, having someone like Katrina who's in the role, who understands. Who's not necessarily at my level—well, because you can't. That conversation where I sobbed to Katrina, there is nobody internally I could have had that conversation with that would have put me in a position where I could have potentially brought someone down. And in sales, mindset is very important. So someone being able to receive your venting—it's something we have to be very aware of—because I don't want to bring the rest of my team down. Having a safe person who's also a woman in sales who can speak to me about things that are hard, I just go find someone like that, because it's so important.

Nikki, I feel like you and Leslie are becoming that for each other, and I love to see it. And I think that's way more. I think we should talk about that more than we should talk about women on women crime, because it's a thing. It happens and it sucks, but the way we fight that is to support each other.

Yeah, I mean usually what dispels it is just for the two women to have a conversation and learn that a lot of it was the narrative that didn't have anything to do with them, right? So for instance, Tyra Banks and Naomi Campbell, right? Famously, during the '90s golden age of supermodels, they were competing against each other for no other reason than that these folks were like, "We already got a Black girl." And so then it built this narrative out there in the world: "Naomi Campbell and Tyra Banks can't stand each other." The truth though is that was never the case. It was never the case. It was the powers that be right, reinforcing this idea that they could only have one Black woman. They only needed one Black girl. That was the problem, right?

So to your point, Ashley, I would go there. I would go to community building with women before I go there. Because it is a thing, but it's a smaller problem, I think, right? Women blocking other women. I think it's a smaller problem.

That's great to hear. Like I'm super pumped to hear that, because to me that would be really unfortunate for all the work, all the work that women are doing in BW Tech, in sales, getting better, doing all the things that they want to do to be successful. And to now kind of come together and collaborate—like I do think moving into '24 it is a collaboration, there's a community. There are things that people need to stop. They need to be more transparent. They need to be a little bit more vulnerable with one another and make sure that we're collaborating so that we can help each other out.

Concrete goals. Concrete goals. So if I come into this and I say, "I want to help women in sales," sure, very different from saying, "I want to help 25 women get jobs as SDRs in sales this year, right?" Now we know who we need help from. We know how much help we need. You know, sort of like me and Leslie, right? It's more than just saying, "I want to learn from women." It's like saying, "Where can I buy tickets to learn?" No, I'm kidding. But that sort of thing, right? Quantified, concrete efforts. I think also, Dale, like going back to the community aspect of it...

It's you know, knowledge is power. And two, there's power in numbers. And I think women have very quickly learned that when you come together and you work together and you support each other, all the shitty things you go through become much more manageable and easier. And again, that's why we have our podcast, that's why we have our monthly meetup, that's why Nikki and Leslie are hosting their event—because it becomes much easier to open those doors together when we all put our heads together, essentially.

And like you said, you have to talk about it, right? There's like this therapy part of it. Because sales can be very lonely. Leadership can be even lonelier. Like, one of the reasons why some of these communities start existing, one of the reasons why Adam and I start working together—like, for all things we should be competing with each other, however, from a collaboration perspective I think what we can do is make sure that we are helping each other out. And making sure that I think it's so understated that just picking up the phone and having a conversation with somebody—like, I met up with George SoDo last night just to grab a quick bite. Like, he's such an awesome human being. But you know, we just started talking and one of the things that I realized is like, I needed people. I needed someone to talk to. I didn't even know I needed to about certain things that were happening. And he was the same way. But we just get into these patterns. Like, we're all patterns, and how do we break these patterns? I think that's the important part.

It makes me think of Riley Blazel. If you haven't heard of him, you should definitely know him. He pops in and he champions as many people as he possibly can in every situation. He sees a post, somebody's saying, "Hey, who are the people we should follow? Hey, who's good in sales?" And there is a significant number of women, people of color, there are people who are underrepresented in tech on that list. And he is doing—it's like Nikki said—that is free for him to do it. It's free. Highly intentional. He is about it. It's highly intentional. He's building his community. I have met him in person. He is fantastic. He's real. It's really important to be like Riley and do it, like do the work. It doesn't have to be a lot. Like, if you are someone in a position of leadership where you can actually check yourself and make sure that the candidates that are women are getting the fair chance, but if you're not, like, there's ways that are free to elevate the voices that are not seen enough.

I shared the other day on LinkedIn. I shared some like what is the criteria that I go through when I'm trying to figure out like, what is this group that I don't identify as? What are they up against? What is my role in it? And how can I be helpful? I can share it with y'all after if you think it'd be a helpful resource for your listeners.

You should put it in the show notes.

Yes, please. I'll put it in the show notes.

So what is—if people want to make a difference, right? So people are listening, whether you're male, whether you're female, and you want to make a difference, what are some top one or two actions that each of you ladies would recommend that people can take right now today as they're listening to this to go make a change, to go influence change? Because again, talk is cheap. Thoughts are cheap. How do we fix it or start to fix it?

Better said, Katrina. I guess I'll start. Um, I mean, we've already covered this one extensively, but I think one of the simplest ways possible—if you are on some sort of social channel, LinkedIn, Twitter—just tag or elevate the voices of women, people of color, whatever it might be, any sort of minority that is posting information that might not go out to a bunch of people. Or do what Riley does. Every time someone says like, "Who are the people that you love?" send that big list. Repost someone's content. It's really not that difficult. It will maybe take thirty seconds to do something like that.

And second, something that I'm actively trying to do is I'm trying to mentor a new person every single quarter, um, whether it's a woman, um, you know, whatever a minority of some sort. And my goal by doing that is one to help them get better at whatever their role is—typically it's BDRs, AEs—and two to network the hell out of them, open as many doors as possible, whether it's to get a new opportunity, to meet another mentor, to meet someone senior that can give them more information that I can't. But again, it doesn't take very much. I do a couple calls a month with them. And I think like that has been the most impactful thing that I've seen so far from anything I've done myself.

I love that. I also think it's important to speak up when you are in—if you're a man or a person with power, you don't have to be a man—who is in those rooms and you hear, even if it doesn't affect you, anything you have to say something. And not let it slide. I've been in the room when people said, you know, behind closed doors, we shouldn't hire more women because they could get pregnant and we don't really want to deal with that. And like, nobody said anything. Say something. Because I wasn't the person that could say something. I literally had a baby at the time. Like, that's probably not going to be very impactful coming from me. But the fact that they said that in front of you—like blows my mind.

No, but it happens. Like, I had one of my very first leadership jobs was a European company. And when they came over, the CEO asked at the end of an interview, remember when, or if they were going to get pregnant. And I was like, you can't do that. I can't believe one, I can't believe you ask that question. Secondly, like, you should never ask that question. And third, does it really even matter? Like, if it's the right person for the job, we go through the process and if something ends up not working out, it doesn't work.

I could not believe that was asked. But you just said it—if it's the right person for the job, I will never forget. And I'm going to call her out by name. Leah Lindsay. One of the best reps I've ever hired in a previous company. Interviewed with me in person, eight months pregnant. And it was the first thing she told me. I mean, she couldn't hide it. Um, she hid it on the phone interviews. And when we met in person, she's like, "I didn't tell you because I thought that you wouldn't move me forward," which is very sad in and of itself that she felt that way. Eight months pregnant, hired her, knowing she was going to go out on maternity leave for two months. Didn't care. She was the best person for the job. And she killed it.

That's the mindset we need to have.

Well, I've been there too. It is terrifying because even if technically they're not supposed to, right, they don't tell you it's in their thought process. But yes, my other actionable thing is I think you should—if you're a male leader, I think that you should intentionally seek out a list of people that you don't necessarily need to actively mentor, but that you can bring up in rooms where their career goals can align, because I think that's the best way to do it: is to get those butts in the seats. Like, let's get those women hired into the roles that they should be in. Maybe it's someone breaking into tech. Maybe it's someone like me who wants to get into leadership. Maybe it's somebody who has a career goal and isn't in that role today. Just collect them and elevate them behind the scenes.

I can't wait to hear from Nikki, but I think there's one woman that both Adam and I both have worked with and mentored—Sydney. And she was amazing. I remember she was in a community I was in and she was, um, I was building up the mentorship program and she was like, "I don't know if I want to be in sales." And she was walking through the whole process. And I'm like, "Let's just give it one more opportunity." And like, she went for it. And now she's an AE. She's like killing it. She's an amazing woman in sales, and I look forward to seeing her grow through the process.

But Ashley, you guys are talking about mentorships and I think to me that is the quickest way to make some of these changes super quickly. And it's not male, woman, like male or women—like everyone should be mentoring as much as you can. If you've had the opportunity and the success, you should be mentoring other people.

Absolutely.

Nikki, two big ones. Let's go. I know you got them. You got them.

Well, the thing is, you guys pretty much said the thing. Which is, you know, I talked earlier about putting actionable parameters around it. And one of the things that I've been thinking about, trying to do for other Black women who are navigating tech sales, um, is it's tough to scale mentorship, right? And what has started to happen to me was I felt bad for every LinkedIn DM that I was not able to respond to. Um, and so I thought about, okay, well, maybe I'll you know, carve out just an hour of office...

hours a week, right? And, you know, invite folks. But again, then I'm only able to help one person a week, which if that's for you, start there, right? But to scale it, right? We've all seen things like "Muffins with Morgan," right? LinkedIn has audio events, right? I would do that with the purpose, not of necessarily talking to those women about their next career goals, but again, we're thinking about this as a platform. So here's how I would do it: I would have this audio event, right? Invite as many underrepresented groups as possible and just listen. Then I would take that transcript and I would pull out insights from those people and make that my content waterfall, right? So now on a regular basis, pick your platform—TikTok, LinkedIn, Twitter, whatever it is, right? Twitter might actually really lend itself, right? So we're on this podcast today. Say Ashley said something that I thought was particularly insightful. I tweeted it out. I tag her, you know what I'm saying? I am just featuring their voices. I am removing myself, and I am directly challenging this idea that sales expertise has a phenotype, right? Or sales expertise comes from one type of vest. I think I just gave myself that idea just now, but I'm so excited about it, right? Because that's, for me, that's really how we start to get there.

And you know, I got this from, or this occurred to me first in a conversation I had with a good friend of mine, Beck Holland at Inbound. Yep, her session was fire, by the way. But we were talking about just that. We were having a very raw conversation about how a person gets in the room. And it came down to, right? There are those of us who decide we have to be like my mom told me, right? Twice as good, you get half as far, right? And so we lean into that. And I think this is what most women in business are doing right now. We lean into, "All right, I just got to be way, way, way, way, way better," right? And then I get into the room.

The problem that occurs to me when I start to think about that is I'm setting other women who come up behind me to also just have to perpetuate having to be way, way, way, way better. I'm sending the message like, "Yeah, this is a system I can work within. I have to be twice as good to get half as far. Okay, here's my ten times as good." No, no. So what I'm talking about with these events and bringing these people together is building a narrative and hopefully a library of content, right? That makes it so that that part is understood, right? That the expertise exists is understood, right? So that there doesn't need to be this, "I need to work way, way harder than everybody else." Now, working hard, we're going to do that because we're salespeople, but we don't have to call it out, you know, in other groups the way we do with women, just to get a foot in the door.

So I don't know. This is where my head's kind of at. We can workshop it.

Yeah, I like it. Let's work. Let's learn from women. Basically, let's keep it going. Like, I've been super grateful for you all joining. Like, I think we have to just continue the conversation.

Yeah, let's keep it. And I think, yeah, measurements and movement. Measurement and movement. It's not as much as I'd like to think we're going to solve it with fifty-two minutes of recording. We're not. As much as I'd like to think we're going to solve it with the downloads that will come from this, we're not. This is an ongoing thing that needs to be talked about frequently, that needs to be addressed often, and needs to remain top of mind. Thank you all of you ladies for being here. You are the best of the best. And I think that, you know, we owe it to you to say thank you. We owe it to the listeners to thank them for sharing this loudly everywhere that they can and making a movement come of this and making this not just be a fifty-some-minute podcast episode that goes off into the oblivion, but something that's talked about over and over and over again. Thank you so much, Ashley. So good to see you. I know we love you, Nikki. Thanks, y'all. Thanks for providing the space.